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Dragon adds Recorder app for time-shifted desktop dictation
It's all about speech on the iPhone 4S, from the systemwide dictation features to the inscrutable but very helpful Siri assistant. The fine folks at Nuance (suppliers of some of the underlying IP that powers the 4S voice savvy) have made a big move into the mobile space; the company already has a suite of iOS apps that cover several speech-related functions. There's Dragon Dictation for text entry, Dragon Go! and Search for finding what you need, Dragon for SalesForce to work with your CRM system, two Dragon Medical apps for search and recording, and the Dragon Remote Mic app that turns your iPhone or iPod touch into a networked microphone for the company's desktop dictation apps (Dragon Dictate for Mac or NaturallySpeaking for Windows). Now there's another member of this growing family: the Dragon Recorder app. Dragon Recorder is a free and straightforward voice recording app designed to pair with the company's transcription software; on the Mac, that means the $150 MacSpeech Scribe application. You can use Recorder to record your voice (only yours; Scribe and its Windows sister product are speaker-dependent) on the go, and then easily transfer the recordings via sync or Wi-Fi browser sharing for later transcription. Of course, you could use the built-in Voice Memos application to achieve much the same result, but you wouldn't get the Wi-Fi sharing feature. Then again, if you're planning to do a lot of mobile dictation, I'd recommend picking up Irradiated Software's drop-dead easy DropVox for $1.99 -- forget transferring your files by sync or by click, they'll just show up automatically in your Dropbox folder ready for transcription. (There's no step 3.) It remains to be seen how much of an impact the new on-device dictation capabilities will have on the pro-level dictation and transcription software market, but if you're already a MacSpeech Scribe user then it's worth giving Recorder a try... that is, if you're not already feeling silly talking to Siri.
Dragon Dictate for Mac now available
That didn't take long. Earlier this year, Nuance Communications took over the MacSpeech product, with the intention of improving what was already a good application. That has now been accomplished, and today Dragon Dictate is available for the Macintosh platform -- a reasonably priced upgrade for MacSpeech users. The new version offers easier editing, the ability to switch between different microphones, and it uses a computer voice to proofread your dictated documents. The speech engine has been updated to new state-of-the-art technology. It's nice to see speech recognition on the Mac that finally has feature parity with the PC versions. There are some nice new and unexpected features like saying 'search Google for Greek restaurants', and you can do a Spotlight search by voice.
Nuance acquires MacSpeech
Nuance Communications, the company behind Dragon Dictate and Dragon Search for the iPhone, has acquired MacSpeech, the company that makes MacSpeech Dictate and other voice recognition apps for the Mac platform. The first product from MacSpeech was iListen, which was available until 2008. At that time it was the only speech recognition app that could provide dictation services for the Mac after IBM discontinued ViaVoice. iListen was replaced with MacSpeech Dictate, and the company licensed the Dragon recognition engine created by Nuance for the program. MacSpeeech Dictate was a big improvement over iListen, but it still wasn't as powerful or as full-featured as the Dragon versions running on the Windows Platform. That's all going to change. Last week I talked with Peter Mahoney, a Senior Vice President at Nuance, who told me the acquisition of MacSpeech will speed up the flow of new features to MacSpeech Dictate. At some point the program will acquire the Dragon name. Mahoney told me we can expect to see a macro scripting language, integrated support for digital recorders, and accuracy improvements. Nuance made a big splash on the iPhone platform with Dragon Dictate [iTunes link] and Dragon Search [iTunes link]. Nuance also provided the speech recognition for Siri [iTunes link], which has received rave reviews.
MacSpeech update something worth talking about
MacSpeech Inc. unveiled a new update to its well regarded speech recognition application for the Mac today. The release of version 1.3, available immediately by download, has some significant enhancements and fixes. To test this new release, I've dictated this review into our browser-based content management system without much trouble. I had to correct a couple of uncommon words, but that is easily done in the spelling mode.One of the interesting features of the new version is a 'cache document' command that will allow MacSpeech to read a document's contents in order to navigate that document, and to enter and edit text. This improves MacSpeech Dictate's ability to work with any document, including documents not created with the program itself. MacSpeech has also greatly improved the help system and added several visual enhancements that will allow users to see the status of the program and the mode it's operating in.The new 'press the key' command will input a specific keyboard key. This allows using modifier keys, such as Control, Option, and Command. MacSpeech Dictate has always had a strong speech recognition engine, but was sometimes weak in the software that surrounded it. Early on, the company distributed some bad install disks, but that was quickly remedied.MacSpeech Dictate requires an Intel-based Macintosh computer with a minimum of OS X 10.4 .11 or 10.5 .2 or higher. Here is a link to more details of the update.MacSpeech Dictate had its last update in November of 2008, when version 1.2.1 was released. Existing users of the program will be prompted to do the update the next time MacSpeech launches. In my case, the update worked well, and without incident.MacSpeech Dictate is US $199.00 direct from the developer or at retail including the Apple online and brick and mortar stores.
TUAW Holiday Giveaway-tacular Part Five: the power blogger
If you're looking to start a podcast or blog (or both) in 2009, this will get you started. The Snowflake mic is an awesome and portable audio tool, and MacSpeech Dictate is the "gold standard" of Mac transcription apps. Win both in this giveaway courtesy our friends at Dr. Bott.Don't forget the rest of our Holiday Giveaway-tacular posts and all the loot you can win there as well: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 and Part 4. Everything ends at the end of December 31, so get to clickin' and good luck! Open to legal residents of the 50 United States, the District of Columbia and Canada (excluding Quebec) who are 18 and older. To enter leave a comment telling us what would be the subject of your podcast, if you had one. The comment must be left before December 31, 11:59PM Eastern Time. You may enter only once. One winner will be selected in a random drawing. Prize: Snowball Microphone ($69.95), MacSpeech Dictate ($199) Click Here for complete Official Rules.
TUAW Hands On: MacSpeech Dictate 1.2 ships
I've written blog posts on planes, on trains, and definitely in automobiles. This is the first time, however, that I've written a section of a post just using my voice. MacSpeech Dictate, version 1.2 (the firstthird version using the Dragon technology licensed from Nuance), released this week, is so much better than any previous Mac dictation system that I find I can't think fast enough to keep up with it. The new MacSpeech version isn't cheap. For $200 you get the software on a CD and DVD, plus a Plantronics headset with a USB adapter (other microphone setups are available as options; I'm using it with a Sennheiser headset). It also has fairly steep system requirements -- you'll need an Intel Mac running 10.4.11/10.5.3 or higher. The software isn't problem free; it can get a little confused when you switch back and forth between dictation and typing, and the interface isn't exactly what I'd call streamlined... but the results are unbelievable. Installation is quite straightforward. Run the app, adjust your headset volume, read about five minutes of training material; then you're ready to roll. Any application that accepts text input will work with the MacSpeech software. Your text appears just as though you had typed it from the keyboard. In my initial testing, accuracy is very, very good. Almost everything I say gets correctly interpreted by the software, so the recognition and correction tools aren't getting much of a workout yet. Later on I'll try some more complicated dictation tasks and see how it goes. Having to announce each punctuation mark and speak like a newscaster could easily get old, and my coworkers may not appreciate me dictating everything every day. I can't deny, however, that there is something truly magical about the power of MacSpeech Dictate. Spell words it doesn't recognize, add custom words to the vocabulary (including entire text documents already written)... just awesome. Back to the keyboard -- I can definitely type faster than I can dictate (at least, so far) and other formatting tasks are much easier with a hand on the mouse. Still, for anyone who faces challenges using traditional inputs methods due to RSI or other restrictions, this new version is definitely worth a close look.
MacSpeech releases Dictate, wins Best of Show
For some time now speech recognition on the Mac has lagged behind Windows, particularly Dragon Naturally Speaking. Well, no more, as MacSpeech, developer of iListen for the Mac, has managed to license the Dragon engine from maker Nuance for the new MacSpeech Dictate announced at Macworld.In addition to standard speech recognition and transcription into various applications like Word and Pages, Dictate also allows you to control your Mac by voice including support for Automator and AppleScript. According to our man on the show floor, it's impressive enough that it has won a Best of Show award.MacSpeech Dictate will be available on February 15 for Intel Macs starting at $199, and registered users of iListen will be able to crossgrade for $99 unless purchased in 2008, in which case it will be $29 (iListen has been discontinued).Update: A press release has been issued with more specifics on pricing. The crossgrade price for iListen users is actually $99; the $29 crossgrade is only available until April 15 to people who purchased iListen in 2008.
